D&D heroes come from widely varying backgrounds: sturdy, practical dwarves, high-minded elves, savage half-orcs, trouble-making humans, and others united in seeking glory.
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Your choice of character race provides you with a basic set of advantages and special abilities. If you’re a fighter, are you a stubborn dwarf monster-slayer, a graceful elf blademaster, or a fierce dragonborn gladiator? If you’re a wizard, are you a brave human spell-for-hire or a devious tiefling conjurer? Your character race not only affects your ability scores and powers but also provides the first cues for building your character’s story.
Whatever drives them, humans are the innovators, the achievers, and the pioneers of the worlds.
Elves are a magical people of otherworldly grace, living in the world but not entirely part of it.
Dwarves are solid and enduring like the mountains they love, weathering the passage of centuries with stoic endurance and little change.
The comforts of home are the goals of most halflings’ lives: a place to settle in peace and quiet, far from marauding monsters and clashing armies.
Gnomes take delight in life, enjoying every moment of invention, exploration, investigation, creation, and play.
Half-orcs are not evil by nature, but evil does lurk within them, whether they embrace it or rebel against it.
Some races are less common than humans, dwarves, elves, and halflings -- but no less compelling, such as tieflings and dragonborn. You can learn more about these races in the Player’s Handbook.